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Friday 28 February 2014

The Cranes have flown...now I'm looking forward to Swallows, Martins, Hoopoes and, most of all....Bee-eaters!

I can't help feeling sad when I realize that the cranes have flown north. Driving north to Salamanca last Tuesday morning we missed the usual groups scattered around the Holm Oaks and only saw a family of three looking a bit uneasy. We'd already seen a group flying from the south above the Sierra de Francia last Sunday, so we suspected that 'ours' would be following suit. That same evening I saw around a hundred heading for the reservoir to sleep, so they'd obviously not all gone, but we haven't seen them again since then. They've stayed here very little this year – they didn't arrive until mid November and other years they stay until the end of March or even early April. Perhaps they prefer the cold to the rain: it's normally much colder, drier and sunnier here but this year we've been getting the tail-end of the Atlantic storms and it's been a wet and windy winter.
Bye-bye Cranes
Still, we have the Storks to keep us company and yesterday I was able to practise my digiscoping on an itinerant visitor to the cow-pond and our village Stork couple. Doesn't help to be short-sighted and getting long-sighted too, which means alot of removing of glasses, squinting into camera screen and calling on the patron saint of digiscoping (now who would that be?) to get things into focus. I like to think my photos are a bit, er, 'impressionist' shall we say?






What the????
I was also pleased to see a Common Starling perched on a tree near my house. We don't normally get them around here, the local residents all being the Spotless Starling, and I thought I saw a group in a tree the other day but they flew off before I'd managed to id them. So here he is, looking good with a couple of Sparrows.


And just so's you can see the difference here's one of the usual suspects, who have a tendency to nest under our roof tiles and somehow their fledgelings squeeze their way into the loft. Guess who has hand-reared several over the last few years.
Spotless Starling doing Elvis impersonation

Wednesday 26 February 2014

A couple of bird-tables

I've just finished making a couple of bird-tables from bits of old wood and branches.
It took all of five minutes for the first intrepid clients to arrive.  The Black Redstart was the first, followed by a Robin, a Great Tit and finally the House Sparrows.
Looks like I'll have to make another trip to town to get more birdseed.

At the weekend we had a walk in the Sierra de Francia.  On leaving the house the thermometre read 3ÂșC so I wrapped up warm. Wasn't really expecting to have to peel off so many layers but February's like that..  I was almost tempted to have a dip in the river!

Arroyo San Benito, between Sequeros and Garcibuey
The old millrace

We saw large groups of geese overhead migrating northwards, probably Greylag, and later around 150 Cranes flew over circling high to get over the mountains - also on their way north from Extremadura? 
Cranes high up
We saw Nuthatches and Treecreepers and a Goldcrest, but the much looked-for Crested Tit eluded us.  Still, it was a beautiful walk and the views out to the Sierra de Bejar were marvellous.


Tuesday 18 February 2014

February and back in Spain.


I spent the first half of February on a parental visit to Yorkshire. Not alot of time to go birding, nor the best weather for it but I was taken out one wonderful morning by birding pal Linda Jenkinson of Start Birding! to Golden Acre Park and it's small but perfectly formed Adel Dam reserve. Can't believe I was brought up just down the road and I didn't know about Adel Dam. When we got taken to Golden Acre we always moaned because it felt like second best to Ilkley moors....


Gt. Spotted Woodpecker. Photo Linda Jenkinson
We stopped by both hides and were lucky to see a female Gt Spotted Woodpecker and a Nuthatch on the feeders.
Nuthatch
From the Dam hide we watched a very sickly looking juvenile Grey Heron and a much livelier female Kingfisher.   

Heron and Kingfisher photos Linda Jenkinson
Lots of Treecreepers around and I was surprised to see how much whiter they are underneath than the Short-toed ones we have in my part of Spain. I assume it must be because they have to deal with poorer light conditions in the north? Ours are much duskier. 

After two weeks in the UK I was very lucky to make my escape from Liverpool airport just before flights were grounded due to the terrible weather and gale-force winds. The massive waves and flooding were shocking to see on the TV and my heart goes out to all directly hit as well as the wetland reserves under water. I just wish this will make our 'leaders' take climate change seriously and stop postponing measures.

During my absence the female stork arrived at our church-tower nest and now they're busy fixing it up.
Storks reunited

We had an interesting outing to our local patch on Sunday afternoon. On our way down we saw Corn Buntings taking up position on their tree-top perches, Rock Sparrows, Meadow Pipits, Crested Larks and Spotless Starlings as well as our neighbourhood Black Redstarts and Stonechats. Down at our plot there were Blue-Tit, Long-tailed Tit, Serin and a tiny Wren hiding quickly in the bushes overlooking a very swollen stream. 
As we were leaving we noticed a very large silhouette on the electric post on the hill overlooking our vegetable plot. As we got nearer we realised it was a Golden Eagle.  
Golden Eagle
It eventually took flight and appeared to be an immature or sub-adult – tail still predominantly white but with very small white crescents on the underwings. Then as it circled two Red Kites appeared and tried to see it off. They chased it around with no success. They were suddenly joined by a much smaller yet fiercer Buzzard, which dive-bombed the eagle several times but to little avail. The Golden eagle kept dipping down to avoid it but remained in the area a good while. Eventually it circled higher and higher and disappeared over the hill.
Red Kites and Buzzard mobbing Golden Eagle
A few seconds later a couple of Black vultures appeared, clearly following the same thermals to gain height. These are possibly the Black vulture pair we hope will nest in the area. We watched them for a while and a Griffon appeared too.

As we approached a stream looking at various mammal trails we heard a grunt and a young Wild Boar thundered up the opposite bank and stopped by a Holm oak to get a good look at us. It was one of those breath-stopping moments. Beautiful.

Then a large hare sprang up and ran across the field, putting the cherry on the cake.

It may still be winter but spring is definitely in the air for alot of nature!